Friday, 1 July 2016

News Release: Seychelles To Host Africa’s Political And Business Leaders As Afreximbank Holds AGM

TopAfrican political and business
leaders, joined by a Nobel laureate and leading international economic expert,
will be among speakers addressing guests as the African Export-Import Bank
(Afreximbank) holds its 23rd Annual General Meeting (AGM) and
related activities in Seychelles from 18 to 24 July.

Information released in Cairo today
by Afreximbank showed that, in addition to host President James Michel of
Seychelles, former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo and no less than three
serving African Presidents, as well as a host of business and economic experts,
including Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize winner in economics, will be speaking
on topics related to the theme, “Africa’s new economy: Intra-African Trade and
the Blue Economy as catalyst for economic transformation” during the event.

Also on the list of speakers are
ministers and central bank governors from Africa and beyond as well as
prominent personalities like Ibrahim Gambari, a former United Nations
Under-Secretary-General; Justin Lin, a former World Bank Chief Economist and
Director, New Structural Economics and Honorary Dean of the National School of
Development, Peking University, China; Liu Liange, President of the China Exim
Bank; and Arni Mathiesen, an Assistant Director-General of the FAO and former
Minister of Finance of Finland.

The heads of many African and
non-African financial institutions, high-level representatives of the
Seychellois government, and renowned experts in African trade finance are also
expected at the AGM.

The
AGM activities will open on 20 July with the two days of seminars exploring
prospects for accelerating economic development and transformation of African
economies through trade, followed on July 22 by the meeting of the Afreximbank
Advisory Group on Trade Finance and Export Development in Africa, which will
feature an African Leaders Roundtable on Intra-African Trade as Catalyst for
Economic
Transformation.

An investment forum, hosted by the
Seychellois Government, and a trade exhibition will take place on 21 July while
the AGM activities will conclude with the formal Annual General Meeting of
Shareholders of the Bank on 23 July.

Afreximbank, with an authorised
capital of $5 billion, has four classes of shareholders. Class “A” is comprised
of African governments, African central banks and African regional and
sub-regional institutions while Class “B” consists of African private investors
and African financial institutions. Class "C" is made up of non-African
financial institutions, export credit agencies and private investors, while
Class “D”, created in December 2012, is a category under which any person or
entity can be allotted shares.

The Bank currently has 41 African
countries as participating states.

The Annual General Meeting of
Shareholders is held each year to take stock of the Bank's activities during
the reporting year.